What experience do people have of feeding this food? Just been on the website and they recommend feeding 2 packs a day for a dog of Chloe's size, how much would this cost? I suspect she may have colitis and have read that this food, especially the Gold herbal range, is good for dogs with sensitive stomachs and skin. She is currently on JWB lamb n rice adult maintenence but is a fussy eater and after putting on 1kg in a week(we are always trying to get her weight up)she has decided that she doesn't want to eat anything now. I hate the fact that her weight fluctuated and would like to find a food she really loves. Hope you can help.
Emily

My dogs have been great since changing over to this food, I feed approx 1 pack (twice a day) for my two larger dogs (36kg and 28kg) and 3/4 pack for my 9 month old who weighs approx 20kg

HTH, Hayley

Do you just feed it on it's own, no biscuits added? How much does a pack cost? I don't know why their website said she would need 2 packs, she's just shy of 20kg!

I do feed this but only as an addition to Burns that I feed.  The dogs love it.  Pets at Home do it for about 64p per pack.  My local pet store do a box of 18 (all one flavour) for £11.50 and I tend to buy it like that.  Shop around is the best thing.

it is a complete food and therefore can be fed on its own. If you suspect colitis I wouldn't add any mixer with it as they are cereal based. you can buy direct from naturediet if you buy 4 boxes of 18 works out about 50p per packet. I think they overdo the quantities required though..I cant get my pup to eat anywhere near the amount they suggest, so i give a complete food too, but i will only do this until the rapid growth stage is over. As for the website if you google search naturediet it should come up.

When our dog was on Naturediet I used to feed her half of what they recommended - you can also buy it at Pets at Home for 59p per pack (this is more expensive than buying it in bulk but if you don't have too much storage space its always an option)

I also feed ND on it's own though the dogs do occasionally get leftovers (they love their Sunday Roast!) but I adjust the ND accordingly.  I used to get mine direct from ND but now get it from Berriewood as they are a little cheaper, but I think they only deliver in the south, to order from ND you would need to order in bulk, I think there were different prices for different quantities?

please convert to 1bs for this gran who,s still in the dark ages i have 2 springers 1 at 19 1bs and other at 20 both bitches one with a skin allergy one [hopefully in welp] whats recommened?

There are 2.2lb in each kg therefore multiply each kg by 2.2 to get the amount in lbs or divide the lbs to get the amount in kgs! :D

My dogs also have Naturediet as a couple of them were fussy eaters, and now the bowls are licked clean!! :)  I mix it in with their Nutro-I give them 1/4 of a pack mixed in with each meal and have lowered the amount of Nutro they get as a result as it is a complete food also- but I always worry that perhaps they're not getting enough!  although, to my eye, they look in fine form and scrounging is not a problem, so I don't think they're hungry outside of meal times, but hey, mothers always worry! :D  Anyway, IMO, Naturediet is a great food, and I hope your dog improves on it! :)

Hi Spaniel Lover
I was interested to read your post.  I feed both my dogs on nutro but it never looks much in the dish.  I give them the recommended amount but the older dog would eat 3 times as much and the younger one is happy with a lot less.  Maybe adding some Nature Diet might suit both.

Hi Joyce, I started adding Naturediet to the Nutro as although my boys would eat it, they never seemed in a hurry to finish it or be particularly excited by it.  I had just received my order of 3 15kg bags of Nutro, so I wasn't going to be in a hurry to swap them over to another dried food to see if they liked that better, so I picked up some Naturediet to try, and clean bowls all round, and quickly too, none left for another one to pinch when my back was turned!  I was feeding the recommended amount also, but have lowered it to just over half that plus the Naturediet mixed in with a bit of warm water-they love it!  Takes a bit of playing around with levels until you find what works best for each dog- what works fine for some wont work for another-I've got 2 that could eat and eat and eat and another 2 that are quite happy with what I give them!  Anyway, I've found it to be a really good food, no nasty things included, and the boys seem to love it too, so thats good enough for me! :D

We fed our lab on naturediet and to start off with he loved it, but really went off it then developed an ear infection and scratched like mad.  Took it off him and put him on Bakers complete and he's mad for it - but I'll wait and see until the next time he goes off his food.

Price wise - I think it's quite expensive - you can buy it direct from them for 10 cases it worked out at £84 including delivery - we put it in the garage without any visitors.  I still have a case of it but sir won't touch it.

Yes, he's a labrador!

Thanks, S-L.  As with your dogs my 2 do eat the Nutro but sometimes they look in their bowls and I can almost hear them mutter 'same old boring stuff again', so I think adding something a bit more tasty might brighten up their mealtimes.  Worth a try anyway. :D

great food, highly recommend it - none of that fake, unnecessary rubbish you find in so many foods.

as for feeding - bear in mind that wet dog food is only about 22% actual nutrition, so you need to feed a lot more than with dry (roughly 87% nutrition).

personally I feed mostly dry and tin to taste, it's also a lot cheaper this way IME!

Nikirushka not quite sure what you mean by (nutrition) and in fact you may have to feed less Naturediet to your dog than other dry foods; the variety of Naturediet that contains 12% protein is, in fact, equivalent to 48% protein, far higher than any dry food!

My Westie is on Naturediet. If you suspect he may have colitis feed him Naturediet Lite as this is recommeneded for this condition. According to the pack my Westie should have 1 and a half packs a day, he has one and no he isn't a mass of skin and bone.
Its a fantastic food it has cured my dog and has given him a new lease of life, you can also e-mail an advisor at Naturediet if you need any advice and they will respond to you quickly.

Where can I buy it in bulk? Chloe now actually waits for her food and really enjoys it so we are sticking with it for now. I've been on the website but can't find the link to buy it,
Thanks

Hee hee, i was confused for weeks trying to find a link on the site to buy it :)  If you use the contact / enquiry link thing, they will send you the relevant details about ordering online :)

tohme i am sure you can help me here..if the 'professionals' are saying expecially in large breeds that we need to watch the protein and fat levels in dry foods as they accelerate normal growth.and take burns for example 21% protein and 11% fat (mini bites) then how come we can feed naturediet at approx 48% protein without a worry? thanks

Dogmad,

Most of the Naturediet types are 10% protein as packaged (just checked a pack of chicken&tripe).  Naturediet is about 75% water and 25% dry material.  (Fresh meat is about 75%-80% moisture/water content.)   If you compared something which has literally no water in it to a moist food you would need to multiple the dry percentages by 4 to equate it to the same food if it were moist.  So, you could say that Naturediet is 40% protein if it was compared to something that literally has NO moisture in it.  However, dry dog food does have some moisture, otherwise you would have dust or rocks so hard a dog's teeth would break.  Dry dog foods have about 10% or a bit less moisture content.

Here's an example from a web site:

If a dry dog food has 10% moisture we know that it has 90% dry matter. So we look at the label and check the protein level that reads 20%. Next, we divide the 20 percent protein by the 90% dry matter and we get 22%, which is the amount of protein on a dry matter basis. Does this make sense so far? Good. Now let us compare this to canned food that has 80% moisture. We know that with 80% moisture we have 20% dry matter. The label shows 5% protein. So we take the 5% and divide it by 20% and we get 25% protein on a dry matter basis. So the canned food has more protein per pound on a dry matter basis after all the water is taken out. We can do the same for fat, fiber, etc.

Hope that helps,

Stacey

Dogs need lots of nutrients; they have actually no known measureable protein requirement [unless of course you can find the scientific studies that show this] (they do however have proven amino acid needs); neither do they have any proven need for carbohydrates [again this is precisely what Waltham (who manufacture Pedigree et al) say on their website] :D

Protein and fat in isolation do not per se accelerate normal growth; what you need to look at is overall calorific value :D

Protein is much misunderstood subject as illustrated by many of the posts on this board; mainly because the pet food labelling laws do not require the detail necessary to intepret the manufacturer's claims to be placed on it.  Many people do not understand the difference between complete and incomplete proteins and/or their suitability/bio-availability of that protein to the dog. Also people are unaware of how to calculate ACTUAL protein content against CRUDE protein content and so, as in the case you have quoted, the crude protein for the burns variety in question is 21% but this equates to 23% when you remove the moisture.

A further calculation is required when comparing protein content by taking into account amounts to be fed; ie you will not necessarily feed the same quantities of different brands, this affects the overall protein content et al ingested.

Dogs do have a requirement for fats, again one should be looking at the type of fats.

Overall calorific values are what should be considered when feeding dogs, as well as suitablity of the ingredients, how available they are to the dog, what percentage of the protein in the food is complete v incomplete etc etc etc.

Manufacturers' labels are merely a starting point................

Not sure if that helps, but I am only an "amateur" :D